I installed the IDE to SD memory card, and everything went smoothly. Now I have MS-DOS installed on the SD card, and I managed to boot with ease.

Regarding the CMOS battery, I ordered a replacement from Ebay, which is essentially an adapter that works with a removable coin battery. We'll see how the installation goes; hopefully, my existing chip battery is easy to remove from the motherboard, just by pulling it out and not needing a soldering tool.

Thanks, everyone, for your help!

Excellent news!
SD adapters can be tricky and problematic in many ways.
If it's a possibility, it's better and simpler to use a real Compact Flash card.